Sarah Brooks
I am lucky enough to have a friend who owns a yacht, and I am even luckier to have been invited sailing round the Caribbean with him for the winter. Four of us will set sail from Bermuda to the Caribbean at the end of November. From there we will go from island to island before making the voyage back to Bermuda next April. I have been on this yacht once before - a few years ago when I spent four days sailing round Bermuda. That is my only sailing experience however, so this journey will be an interesting one
..lets hope I survive to tell the tale!daughteroffanji
Travel Blog Posts
March 23rd 2009
We originally set sail with the aim of first going to St Martin and then the BVIs, but after beating up wind for what seemed like a lifetime we decided that it was a better idea to go to the BVIs first and St Martin later. This actually turned out for the best though, as it meant that we could meet up with Paulina (Alex’s mum) who had flown down to Virgin Gorda to help sail a rather nice yacht back to Bermuda with some friends of hers. The boat is called Big Bear and is elegantly mean looking with fancy Kevlar, jet black sails. It’s a beautiful, spacious and luxurious boat, definitely the nicest yacht I’ve set foot on. It was a pleasure to meet the owner, Jonathan, who informs me he is a big ... read more
March 8th 2009
So we decided to head back down south so that we could meet up with the Picton Castle, a tall ship that Alex, Ed and Scott have all sailed on at some point in the past. As it turns out we arrived a little early, as the PC didn’t arrive for a following 9 days, but it was nice to be back in Bequia again. As we’d spent two weeks here already, we mainly used our time for relaxing, enjoying the nightlife and making some new friends. I got to see the steel drum players at one of the waterfront bars again which I particularly enjoyed as I didn’t get to see them properly the last time we were here. We unfortunately had to say our goodbyes to Scott and Shannon here, which was one of ... read more
March 7th 2009
Our stay in Iles des Saintes was short but sweet, we stayed for only a few days but this was more than enough time to see the area. There are a number of small islands here and we went to the largest, Terre d’en Haut, which is a beautiful little French island with the only small town in the whole of The Saints. Like Martinique, the place was very French and had cheap wine, good cheese and a fantastic ice cream shop. After a wonder round the small town I came across the best shop I have ever been in, any girl reading this will understand. The shop was full of gorgeous items of clothes all designed and made by the woman who owns the shop, I loved everything in there, so much so that I ... read more
February 28th 2009
09.00 - Wake up to the sound of Scott frying an egg or to the smell of Ciara making coffee. 09.01 - Open my eyes to see a very messy cabin and 4 bodies still attempting to sleep amongst the chaos. 09.20 - Eat breakfast that someone else has made for me (usually a full breakfast, French toast, pancakes or porridge) 10.00 - Shave my legs on deck and bathe in the sea. 10.10 - Rinse off using the fresh water from the tanks to avoid getting a rash from the sea water. 10.15 - Get dressed. 10.25 - Listen to Alex complain about having to do galley duty and someone has left the jam jar open. 10.30 - Wait for everyone else to get ready. 10.45 - Still waiting. 10.55 - Everyone is just about ... read more
February 18th 2009
Dominica is on par with Bequia in terms of how much I like the place and how much I enjoyed my time there. The island is gorgeous, it’s one of the taller islands and therefore holds rain clouds rather well, this means that it rains a lot here but also means that there is an abundance of lakes, rivers, waterfalls, rainbows, hot sulphur springs and even a boiling lake. Dominica is known for its rainbows and moonbows, we saw some excellent rainbows and beautiful sunsets, but no moonbows unfortunately. The scenery here is some of the best I have ever seen and I believe Dominica has some wonderful natural beauties that I have been lucky to set eyes on. The island is quite large, so to take full advantage of what was on offer we decided ... read more
February 2nd 2009
We noticed an immediate change upon arriving in Martinique, rather than being like any other Caribbean island we’ve been to so far, it’s much like arriving in France. The plug sockets are European, their currency is the Euro, the place is full of boulangeries and everyone speaks French; these things may be good or bad depending on your view of France. We made the most of the cheap cheese, wine and baguettes, I got particularly addicted to the baguettes when we were there and missed them tremendously after leaving. On our second day in Martinique we were thrown into a number of circumstances that I don’t think anyone was particularly expecting; the first was that all the French islands in the Caribbean went on strike to protest against the ridiculous rise in the cost of living. ... read more
January 21st 2009
Bequia was a delight to visit, the main strip is laid out along the waterfront so everything is visible and easy to find. The main path along the waterfront leading to all the bars and restaurants is right next to the sea, with the tide quite often rising over the path. When we first arrived we had no food or water left and to top it off it was a Sunday and none of the food shops were open, so we decided that this would be the perfect excuse to go out for dinner. We found a nice pizzeria on the sea front with a lovely view of the harbour; here we filled our bellies for a very reasonable price. After the meal we did our usual exploration of the new vicinity, it was only 5 ... read more
January 18th 2009
Mayreau is a small island that I found to be quite similar to Petit Martinique, it is located next to the 5 small islands of the Tobago Cays which are ringed with amazing coral reefs. We spent only a few days around the area, far less time than we should have spent as I could have snorkelled round the Cays day after day. We spent our time exploring Mayreau and found that the island was extremely steep; in fact, I think I doubled the strength of my leg muscles just from walking round. The island didn’t seem at all touristy, apart from one fancy hotel where we ended up one afternoon to steel their internet. The highlight for me was snorkelling in the Tobago Cays, we were informed that the area offers some of the best ... read more
January 14th 2009
On our way to Petit Martinique, we anchored just off a small uninhabited island to the north of Grenada. We decided to go ashore and cook a campfire dinner on the beach, although Alex stayed on the boat as he was worried about dragging anchor since we weren’t in the most sheltered of anchorages. Scott informed us of an excellent technique he had learned for lighting a campfire which involves the use of a cotton wool ball covered in Vaseline, unfortunately, the closest thing we had to a cotton wool ball was a box of tampons. So there we were, on the beach attempting to light damp wood with a Vaseline soaked tampon. After a substantial amount of time we finally got a decent fire going for us to cook our hot dog sausages and bannock ... read more
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